


No Dawn, No Day

by FaintlyMacabre



Category: The Penumbra Podcast
Genre: Abandonment Issues, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Fluff, Huddling For Warmth, Jet and Rita are only there for a second, Junoverse | Juno Steel Universe, Other, Post-Episode: s03e01-02 Juno Steel and the Man in Glass, Pretty light on the hurt and heavy on the comfort, Stranded, and there was only one bed
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-18
Updated: 2020-10-18
Packaged: 2021-03-09 00:55:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,640
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27085939
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FaintlyMacabre/pseuds/FaintlyMacabre
Summary: Not long after the Zolotovna job, Juno and Peter are sent to meet with an old contact of Buddy's. Trouble is, when they get to the meeting spot, no one meets them, and they're stuck on an asteroid in some forgotten part of the galaxy with no weapons, no comms, and no way to get themselves out of there.
Relationships: Peter Nureyev/Juno Steel
Comments: 15
Kudos: 88
Collections: New Year's Resolutions 2020





	No Dawn, No Day

**Author's Note:**

  * For [KiaraSayre](https://archiveofourown.org/users/KiaraSayre/gifts).



> New Year's Resolution fic for KiaraSayre, because I also love tropes! And because Orbit is one of my absolute faves.
> 
> Title is from Cosmic Love by Florence and the Machine, because I was listening to Hozier's cover on loop yesterday and it's stuck in my head forever now.

“Do you think they’ll be back?”

Juno turned at the sound of Nureyev’s voice, but Nureyev wasn’t looking at him. Instead, he was staring off into the sky, unmoving, as though he could see the Carte Blanche from where he was standing. Juno squinted up with his one good eye. No ship, no deus ex Ruby 7, just a whole mess of stars. He didn’t know if it made him feel better or worse that he didn’t recognize their configuration after nearly four decades of life on Mars.

“‘Course they’ll be back, what do you mean?”

Nureyev shook his head. “No, you’re right, of course.”

“Nureyev—” He looked up at Juno sharply and then glanced around, but they were alone. Of course they were alone. That was the problem. “Sorry. Would you feel better if we went inside?”

“Hmm, yes, inside,” Nureyev said, one corner of his mouth turning up. “Such as it is.”

“Finest accommodations this side of—the hell’s the name of this asteroid again?”

“3057-RE,” Nureyev said. “You do take me to the nicest places.”

“Only the best—” Juno cut himself off before he could get further into that statement. How would he have finished that? Only the best for my former enemy, my rescuer, my almost lover, my one-time ticket out of that hellhole of a city? “—For you,” he finished lamely. Nureyev smiled and looked down as though he’d been able to hear the possibilities cycle through Juno’s mind. “Yeah, let’s just get inside.”

Wherever their absent contact had run or been dragged off to, it couldn’t have happened very long ago. The bed was made, dishes sat (dry) in a dishrack—there was even still water in the kettle, though it had gone cold before they got there.

“I guess we can rule out the possibility that they got stuck in traffic coming back from the grocery store.”

“Oh, I don’t know about that.” Nureyev had started poking around in the cupboards. “They certainly seem to have needed a trip to the store. It just may not be one they’ll come back from.” That statement made the hair stand up on the back of Juno’s neck. Why that was the thing that got him, he didn’t know. He’d dealt with being dropped on a literal rock somewhere at the ass end of the galaxy. They were really at the ass end of the rock, too. Nothing around as far as the eye could see, though some of that may have been the fault of the topography.

Maybe the hair standing up was more a result of the cold than any sense of foreboding. “I’m going to close the windows,” Juno said, and made his way around the single room shack. It was the kind of place that Dark Matters might have dropped him if he’d really refused to work with “Agent Glass” way back when. Honestly, he might have called it cozy, except…

He groaned.

“What?” Nureyev said.

“The windows are closed already. The wind must be getting in through cracks in the walls.”

“Well. That’s not ideal.”

“So, some pluses,” Juno said over his half of the soup. (Nureyev had found one can in the corner of a cabinet—cloned beef barley—and then he’d built a fire in the fireplace. “If nothing else, I certainly know how to heat up a can of soup over an open flame,” he’d said, and Juno had stepped aside and let him work.) “One: it’s not cream of mushroom.” Nureyev chuckled indulgently, a blanket wrapped around him as he ate. There was only one comfy chair, and rather than decide who would take it, they’d elected to sit on the floor, as close to the fire as was safe. “Two: Jet’s not going to bang on the wall because we’re talking too loud.”

“To be honest, Juno,” Nureyev said with a small smile, “I would prefer to risk Mr. Sikuliaq’s ire, so long as we were safely aboard the ship.”

“Okay, fair.” Juno pushed the last few spoonfuls around his bowl. It had gone cold in a hurry, and the consistency now left something to be desired. “You want the rest of this?”

“Absolutely not,” Nureyev said. “I split that exactly, and I’m not taking any of your food.”

“Not even if it’s very gross and I ask really nicely?”

“Juno.”

“Fine.” Juno took a mouthful of soup and talked through it. “Happy?”

Nureyev grimaced. “Ecstatic.”

Juno finished his dinner. “You cooked, I’ll clean.”

“Abandoned shack in the middle of nowhere, rescue imminent,” Nureyev said, handing his bowl to Juno. “Is doing the dishes really necessary?”

“Gives me something to do with my hands,” Juno said. “Makes this feel a little more normal.”

“Yes,” Nureyev said absently. “Normal.”

Juno couldn’t stop watching Nureyev over his shoulder while he washed—although, to be fair, it didn’t take long to wash two bowls and two spoons. Nureyev was sitting right where Juno had left him, curled up small with the blanket wrapped around him, staring into the fire.

“No heat or electricity, but at least there’s running water.”

Nureyev looked up and smiled. “And a roof overhead. It’s not nothing.”

Juno held out a hand and pulled Nureyev to his feet. “Come on.”

“Where?” Nureyev said, looking around the room.

“It’s about time for our talk.”

“Is it? It doesn’t feel like the same time at all.”

“Yeah, you got me, I’m just guessing.”

They sat down on the bed. The mattress was softer than Juno had expected.

“So,” he began, “how was your day?”

From the look on Nureyev’s face, Juno guessed he hadn’t known he was going to start laughing, but there he was, doubling over, his shoulders shaking. If nothing else, at least Juno could make him laugh.

“Oh, you know,” Nureyev said, taking off his glasses to wipe away tears. “Not terribly exciting. And yours?”

“It started out okay,” Juno said. “I was going to go to work with one of my favorite colleagues—”

“'One of?'”

“Yes.” At Nureyev’s mock-affronted look, Juno continued, “It’s a short list!”

“Oh, very well. Please continue. I’m eager to hear what happened next.”

“But after we got dropped off and we’d finally gotten down the side of this damn crater, our contact was nowhere to be found, and we had to break into their house to get out of the cold.” He glared at the nearest wall. “Well, kind of.”

“Hmm, I do hope your mysterious contact is all right,” Nureyev said. “Unless, of course, they deliberately ran off to double-cross you.”

“Yeah, that would suck,” Juno said. He wrapped his own blanket tighter around himself. “Hey, you said something earlier—you asked if I thought they were coming back for us.”

“Did I?” Nureyev said, not looking at him.

“You did,” Juno said. “Nureyev, are you—do you actually think Buddy would abandon us?”

“You make it sound so… intentional,” Nureyev said. “It would require nothing more than a non-action. To be clear, I don’t think that she would want to leave _you_ behind, but as she said, she only took me on because we’d worked together. If I were too much trouble, she might perhaps decide to... cut her losses."

“No. No way,” Juno said. “Listen, I don’t put a lot of stock in the whole ‘family’ thing, but I think Buddy really believes it. And she said you did well, didn’t she? Even if she wanted to take you down a peg or two at that first meeting, she’s not about to ditch either of us. And both of us at the same time? When we still only have the map? That would be stupid, and Buddy isn’t stupid.”

“No, of course, you’re right.”

“You don’t sound convinced.”

“I don’t necessarily need to be. I only need to wait and see if you’re right.”

The conversation wound down and the light didn’t change much, but Nureyev was getting worse at hiding his shivering. He seemed to think that not looking at Juno was camouflage enough.

“Come on.”

Nureyev looked up at him, finally. “Pardon?”

“You’re shaking harder than Rita on caffeine. Come here.” Juno unwrapped one arm from around himself, and the cold he let in was bracing.  
  


“That’s quite all right, Juno, I’m f-fine,” Nureyev said.

“Almost made it through the whole sentence there,” Juno said. “Seems like a dangerous time to be stubborn, don’t you think? I mean, _I’m_ freezing, and _you’re_ skin and bones.”

Nureyev sighed but ducked under Juno’s arm anyway. “Well, if it will make you feel better.”

“Your generosity knows no bounds,” Juno said with an eye roll. Nureyev leaned against him cautiously, as though he was afraid to put any of his weight on him. Juno just kept an arm around his shoulder, letting him shift around as needed. Something Juno had noticed before, in the last week and change that they’d been talking: he didn’t have to look up at Nureyev when they were sitting next to each other. Most of Nureyev’s height was leg. Still, he had to curl his torso to curve around Juno, and the way he moved, he seemed to be trying not to breathe or even touch Juno.

Juno was about to apologize and suggest that Nureyev put his arms over if that would be easier, when Nureyev seemed to give up and tucked his legs up over Juno’s lap, hiding his face against Juno’s neck. It was Juno’s turn to stop breathing for a moment. He felt as though he were holding something fragile, and in a way, he supposed he was. Nureyev held himself stiff and light as a doll, as though he didn’t know if he was allowed. Juno wrapped his arms closer around Nureyev and took a deep, deliberate breath.

“How is your nose so much colder than the rest of your face?” Juno grumbled, making absolutely no move to suggest he’d be letting go anytime soon.

Nureyev huffed out a laugh and relaxed minutely. “I thought you said you were freezing. You’ve been keeping all this warmth to yourself.”

“Pretty selfish of me,” Juno said, resting his chin atop Nureyev’s head.

“Hmm,” Nureyev answered, and tightened his arms around Juno.

It was the feeling of falling that woke him. Juno gasped and sat up. His arms were cramped from holding something—someone—Nureyev—and cold air whispered over his face.

“Hmm?” Nureyev stirred. “What? Juno?”

“No, it’s okay, I think,” Juno said. He blinked and shook his head. “Just woke up. I don’t think it was anything.”

“One of us should stay awake,” Nureyev slurred.

“We definitely shouldn’t keep sitting like this,” Juno said, lowering his head to his left, then his right, feeling his neck crack. “We won’t be able to move in the morning.”

“How will we even be able to tell it’s morning?” Nureyev said. He stretched his long legs and groaned.

“Hopefully, a car outside. I can take the first watch.” Juno made to stand up.

“Where are you going?”

“Like you said, one of us should probably stay awake—”

Nureyev shook his head. “Too cold,” he said around a yawn. “I changed my mind.”

“You’re not worried?” Juno said, even as he finally toed off his shoes.

“It’s no good keeping watch if we freeze to death.” Nureyev took off his own boots and glasses and curled back onto the bed. There, he hesitated. “Unless, you’d rather…”

Unless he’d rather what? Stay awake? Pace? Freeze? Or maybe the whole sentence would have just been, “Unless you’d rather not.” After all, the last time they’d crawled into bed together, Nureyev had woken up to find him gone. No apology or forgiveness would ever erase that. But it was what it was, and all Juno could do now was try to do better going forward.

“Scoot over,” he said. “Actually, let me take the wall side.”

Nureyev looked relieved, but all he said was, “If you’re that eager to shield me from the wind, I certainly won’t argue.”

“Yeah, well, one of us decided a silk shirt was the way to go this morning, and it wasn’t me,” Juno teased. They arranged their various blankets until they were sufficiently cocooned.

“Suppose our contact does show up, eventually,” Nureyev said, a little too lightly. They were both a little too awake now, a little too hesitant, back to not quite touching.

“You mean, and finds us sleeping in their bed, having used their fire fuel and eaten their last can of soup?” Juno said.

“That is what I mean, yes,” Nureyev said, eyes darting over Juno’s face.

“Personally, I think they should have to wait until we’re ready to get up,” Juno said.

Nureyev chuckled. “After all, they did rather inconvenience us.”

“Yeah, we’re not about to take that lying down,” Juno said. “Or, well, we are.”

Nureyev rolled his eyes. Then he shivered. The bed was almost too narrow to have sides, as it was, and he’d rather shiver than reach out? But then he did reach out, slowly put a hand on Juno’s waist. Juno touched his arm, rubbed it, and then pulled him closer. Peter’s lips pressed against his forehead, not quite a kiss.

“Is this all right?” Nureyev said, and Juno felt him form the words on his skin.

“Yeah,” Juno said. “This?” He stroked up Nureyev’s back.

“Mmm.”

The last time they were here, there were half confessions and promises that wouldn't keep, possibility that only got farther away when they tried to grab it. The next time they laid down together (and it didn't seem like only wishful thinking to believe that there would be a next time), _this_ would be the last time they’d been here. This would be the association that was freshest in their minds.

“Nureyev, I—” Juno began. “You know I never—I never stopped—”

“Shh,” Nureyev soothed, arms wrapped around him. “You don’t have to say anything, dear detective. Just rest.” Then, after a moment, quieter: “Neither did I.”

Juno opened his eye and saw nothing. After a moment, he realized that was because his face was pressed to Nureyev’s chest. After another moment, he realized he was awake because of the sound of an approaching engine.

“Nureyev,” he mumbled. “Nureyev, wake up, someone’s here.” Nureyev’s eyes shot open and his whole body tensed.

“Who is it?”

“I don’t know, I think it’s a car.”

Nureyev pulled himself up to the head of the bed and braced himself on Juno’s shoulder to look out the window. Juno wondered how much he could see without his glasses.

“Oh, thank god,” Nureyev said, slumping down onto Juno. “It’s Jet and Rita.”

Juno could already hear Rita’s cries of “Mistah Steel!” followed by footsteps. There was a knock. “Juno. Ransom. Are you there?”

“We’re here,” Juno called back. “Just a second.” They sat up to pull their shoes back on, and Juno handed Nureyev his glasses.

“Thank you—” Nureyev seemed to cut himself off, and shook his head. “Thank you.”

“Anytime,” Juno said. He wondered what he could even say to Nureyev that might keep him from feeling like any closeness that might have been achieved between them had to be left on this godforsaken rock in space. But, as usual, Nureyev surprised him.

“You were right,” he said.

“Happens more than you'd think,” Juno said. “About what?”

“They came back for us,” Nureyev said. “I shouldn’t have doubted.”

“Yeah, well, I meant what I said.” Juno hesitated. “All of it.”

“I—” Nureyev looked surprised for a moment before a small smile crossed his face. “I know.”

“Good.” Another knock. “We better get out there before the big guy knocks the door down.”

Nureyev smiled. “Yes, I think I’m more than ready to go... back.”

And okay, it wasn’t everything. But it was something. It was enough.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading! I hope you liked it!


End file.
